A little over a month into the new college basketball season, the national title picture has already begun to shift.
Michigan, Arizona and UConn are each building a case to challenge Purdue as the No. 1 team in the sport, while Florida and Kentucky are each in jeopardy of falling from the preseason top 10 to outside the AP Top 25.
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Which rocky starts are aberrations? Which are warning signs? The early-season college hoops panic meter assesses some of the most intriguing situations.
Kentucky (5-3)
The most expensive roster in college basketball continues not to perform up to its reported $22 million price tag.
Kentucky still has yet to beat anyone with a pulse one month into the season.
The first warning sign was a mid-November loss at rival Louisville. The Wildcats surrendered 96 points and trailed by as many as 20 before rallying late to put a scare into the Cardinals.
An 83-66 neutral-court loss to Michigan State a week later was more worrisome. When Mark Pope finally emerged from the locker room 45-plus minutes after the game ended, he described his team as “disappointed and discouraged and completely discombobulated.”
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The biggest gut punch was Tuesday night’s frustrating 67-64 home loss to a good but perhaps not elite North Carolina team. Dreadful 1-for-13 shooting from behind the arc contributed to a winnable game slipping away from Kentucky, as did surrendering 22 second-chance points to the Tar Heels.
When Kentucky hired Pope two years ago, the one thing the Wildcats were supposed to be able to count on was a modern, efficient offense loaded with skilled playmakers and floor-spacing outside shooters. That has not materialized this season after Pope seemed to prioritize length, athleticism and defensive potential when building his roster in the offseason.
“It’s going to be hard for us to win scoring 64 points,” Pope told reporters after the game. “It’s uncommon for us to be 1-for-13 from 3. That’s not really who we are. More disappointing is the eight assists. That’s really frustrating. I thought in the second half, our decision-making was really poor.”
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It’s worth noting Kentucky is playing without Jaland Lowe, expected to be the team’s starting point guard and top playmaker before suffering a shoulder injury in the second game of the season. The Wildcats also miss the interior defense and rebounding of projected lottery pick Jayden Quaintance, who is still working his way back from a torn ACL, and power forward Mouhamed Dioubate, who has missed three straight games with a sprained ankle.
Those players returning would give Kentucky a boost, but in the meantime the rest of the roster is underachieving.
The introduction of Kentucky’s new football coach at halftime Tuesday night inspired more raucous cheers at Rupp Arena than anything the basketball team has done so far this season.
Panic meter: 7 out of 10
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Florida (5-3)
Does Florida have a Xaivian Lee problem?
The coveted Princeton transfer so far has not performed to the level he was expected to when the reigning national champions landed him last April.
Through eight games, Lee is shooting 24.7% from the field and is struggling to hit from distance or to finish through contact at the rim. The 6-foot-4 senior followed his most encouraging game of the season against Providence last Friday with a 1-for-10 nightmare in a 67-66 loss at Duke on Tuesday night.
Florida returned every frontcourt player from last season’s title run, but the departure of Walter Clayton Jr., Chris Richard, Alijah Martin and Denzel Aberdeen meant that Todd Golden had to rebuild his backcourt on the fly. Golden responded by plucking Lee and fellow prized transfer Boogie Fland out of the portal in hopes they both could replace some of the scoring and playmaking the Gators had lost.
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Lee had a long line of high-major suitors after averaging 17.1 points and 5.5 assists at Princeton last season while sinking a career-best 36.6% of his 3s, but the transition from the Ivy League so far has been rocky. It’s a little reminiscent of Aidan Mahaney, an all-conference guard at Saint Mary’s who too often looked uncomfortable and overmatched against power-conference competition in his lone season at UConn last year.
Xaivian Lee is shooting just 21% from 3-point land this season for the Gators. (Photo by Jacob Kupferman/Getty Images)
(Jacob Kupferman via Getty Images)
Credit the rest of the Gators for keeping the team afloat while Lee has floundered.
Florida has split six games against high-major competition, defeating Florida State, Miami and Providence while enduring losses to Duke, Arizona and TCU by a combined 11 points. The Gators nearly rallied from a double-digit halftime deficit at Duke, making up for poor shooting by blitzing the offensive glass.
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If Lee bounces back from a rough opening month, this Florida team is capable of contending in the SEC. If not, the Gators might still be an AP Top 25-caliber team, but they’re not the threat to repeat they once were thought to be.
Panic meter: 5 out of 10
Ole Miss (5-3)
Moments after Ole Miss’ non-competitive home loss to Miami this past Tuesday night, a reporter asked senior guard AJ Storr how the Rebels can fix their sporadic effort and develop a greater sense of urgency.
“I mean, you can’t really do too much besides …” Storr began.
Then Ole Miss coach Chris Beard cut him off.
“We can play different players,” Beard said sharply.
That news conference clip speaks volumes about where Ole Miss is as a basketball team one month into the new season. The Rebels have dropped all three games they’ve played against power-conference competition. They’re not shooting well. They’re getting beaten to loose balls and rebounds. And their head coach is becoming frustrated.
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Beard used 13 players Tuesday night against Miami in an effort to find a lineup combination that would play with effort and intensity. When a 16-point halftime deficit ballooned to 19 less than two minutes into the second half, Beard responded by yanking all five of his starters off the floor and keeping them on the bench for nearly five minutes of game time.
That Ole Miss is in such disarray is a bit of a surprise considering Beard’s track record of getting his teams to outperform expectations. The Rebels lost five double-digit scorers from last year’s Sweet 16 teams but reloaded on the fly by adding a slew of intriguing newcomers around returning standout Malik Dia.
Don’t bet against Beard turning this around and molding Ole Miss into an NCAA tournament contender, but it could get worse for the Rebels before it gets better. They visit St. John’s on Saturday. That’s not exactly a get-right game.
Panic meter: 6 out of 10
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Indiana (8-1)
It didn’t matter that Minnesota entered on a three-game losing streak. Or that the injury-ravaged Gophers were down to nine scholarship players.
Indiana still received a rude reminder Wednesday night that going on the road in the Big Ten will not be easy.
Darian DeVries endured his first loss as Indiana coach, falling 73-64 against a Minnesota team that is likely to finish near the bottom of a stacked Big Ten this season. The Gophers were projected to finish third-to-last in the league’s preseason poll and have already dropped games against the WCC’s San Francisco and Santa Clara.
This loss will be a stain on Indiana’s NCAA tournament resume, but it might be a bigger blow to the psyche of the Hoosiers and their fanbase. Indiana fans were hoping DeVries was building meaningful momentum when the Hoosiers started 8-0, including blowouts of Marquette and Kansas State. Now, between the Minnesota loss and the fact that neither Marquette nor Kansas State appears to be any good, it’s more difficult to trust Indiana.
Indiana is hoping Darian DeVries can return the program to the NCAA tournament for the first time since 2023. (Photo by Michael Hickey/Getty Images)
(Michael Hickey via Getty Images)
What Minnesota did to overcome the talent gap was slow down the pace, play hard and control the glass. The Hoosiers surged to within three twice in the final four minutes, but that was as close as they would get.
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“Overall, it was a little disappointing,” DeVries told reporters after the game. “Defensively, we’ve been pretty good all year. I thought we just gave up a lot of clean opportunities for them tonight, some layups, some open 3s. Then offensively, we kind of let their physicality bog us down a little bit and we didn’t get the kind of quality shots that we’ve been getting.”
Bigger tests await for the Hoosiers, starting with matchups against Louisville and Kentucky the next two Saturdays. While one bad loss can’t undo Indiana’s 8-0 start, it does significantly temper expectations.
Panic meter: 4 out of 10
Oregon (4-4)
Dana Altman isn’t exactly quieting critics calling for him to retire.
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It was bad enough Oregon suffered its fourth consecutive loss Tuesday night at home against USC. Then the 67-year-old Altman described his team as “poorly coached” and hinted that he’s struggling to get through to his players.
“My job is to get my team to do what we need to win and play the way we’ve got to play to win, and I’m not doing it,” Altman told reporters in Eugene. “They’ve got a better way. I don’t know if it’s their girlfriends or their agents or their parents. I’m not sure who’s advising them right now, but I know I’m about seventh on the list.”
Dana Altman and the Oregon Ducks are off to a sluggish 4-4 start. (Photo by Katelyn Mulcahy/Players Era/Getty Images)
(Katelyn Mulcahy/Players Era via Getty Images)
Oregon has traditionally started slowly and peaked entering March under Altman, but this year’s Ducks are digging an especially deep early hole. They were lucky to eke out narrow victories against the likes of Hawaii, Rice and Oregon State. They dropped all three games at the Players Era tournament against Auburn, San Diego State and Creighton. Then they came home with a sense of urgency and opened a 10-point first-half lead over undefeated USC, only to let it slip away.
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Missed box-outs and defensive breakdowns down the stretch proved costly. So did some ill-advised early shots that allowed USC to get out in transition.
It all scarcely resembles Oregon’s glory days under Altman when the Ducks reached a Final Four and regularly contended for conference championships.
“Our parts are better than what we’re playing right now,” Altman said in advance of the USC game.
That has to change or the Ducks could miss the NCAA tournament for the third time in five seasons.
Panic meter: 7.5 out of 10
